Online Backup Vs. Cloud Storage

Online backup services such as Carbonite, Acronis, IDrive and Mozy might be a bad deal for some users when compared to cloud storage services Box, Dropbox, Google Drive and Microsoft Skydrive. The former usually just backs up files; the latter does backs up files and also gives you working access to them.

Before cloud storage services established themselves, online backup services had been around for years. Carbonite was big enough to get itself preloaded on many OEM Windows systems and became the most famous of the online services. Mozy is also very well known. At the same time, many general security suites have for years included online backup as a feature. Typically you get a few gigabytes with the base subscription price of the suite and can buy more storage. Symantec, McAfee and Comodo are three that take this approach.

As a general rule, online backup services allow you to back up and restore files. That's it. With hard drive sizes well into the hundreds of gigabytes, this necessarily means that you're only backing up a portion of your system, so many of these services default to backing up your My Documents and other data folders.

Cloud storage is different. These services take a portion of your hard drive and synchronize it with the online storage. Make changes on the hard disk and they are quickly replicated to the cloud storage. If you have other systems on the account, the files are synchronized down to them. And so as you work on your files they are automatically backed up.

So why bother with backup services at all? Perhaps a cloud service is at least as good at backup and gives you full access as well. This is very often true, and so I'm sure there are many users who are paying for an online backup service who would be better-served by a cloud storage service.

On the other hand, SugarSync is expensive. Looking at 100 GB as an example, SugarSync costs 50% more than Dropbox, 150% more than Google Drive, and 200% more than SkyDrive. Pure backup products are cheaper per gigabyte and they'd better be, because they do so much less.

I found this review roundup of 27 online backup services on About.com. A quick survey of these services gives me the impression that the backup-only ones tend to be cheaper per gigabyte, perhaps even advertising unlimited backup space.

Claims of "unlimited" service on the Internet usually have some sort of caveat in them. Many years ago I challenged Web hosting services that claimed "unlimited bandwidth" for cheap hosting accounts whether that was literally true -- and they generally admitted that customers who abuse the privilege would be persuaded to be reasonable. Carbonite says only that "...for exceptionally large backups -- 200GB or more -- backup speed will slow noticeably after the first 200GBs have been backed up."

The real question you should ask yourself is whether online backup of more than 100 GB really makes sense for you. It's possible that you have a large music or image or video library you'd like to back up; if so, a pure backup service is probably your best solution. But maybe not your only solution.

As I recently explained, Dropbox has changed the way I work because of how it keeps all my computers in synch. I don't care about backing up files anymore. They're all in Dropbox. Most of my photos are on Phanfare, a separate service I like. This is something else to consider: Are all your images in Picasso, your music in iTunes, and so on? You might already be backed up.

Paying for and using a backup service is the sign of a smart user who knows things can go wrong. Go a little further and make sure you're getting the best kind of backup for the way you use your data.

I came across this link from just some general reading and i know it's old but still worthwhile to share some views. I am an IT manager so quite tech savvy. For consumer backup solutions there are quite a lot, I think the questions to consider are where do you want data stored and also access to support people. All these unlimited plans are dangerous, at some point the business wont be able to cope with it and just fall flat, so be careful and dont choose because its cheap. Cloud Storage can be confused with backup so just look into what you actually want to do. I know Apple have their own iCloud solution, I heard this company Backup Everything is good, business wise and servers again test these services out throughly. Anyway hope that helps.

Use Live Drive.. Two terabytes of fully encrypted storage that you have the ability to access from any computer, tablet, or phone from anywhere for $12/mo... great stuff. I got the briefcase option. This company offers the best price I can find as far as quality cloud storage goes. Here's the link to the different packages http://www.livedrive.com/?a_aid=537373cedf18e

Thanks Larry for such as a good info. Yes, there are many users who are paying for an online backup service who would be better-served by a cloud storage service. And most importantly, those cloud storage such as Google Drive and Dropbox offer quite a large storage for free! So people like me who like freebies will just use it as online backup by just uploading the files to these storage. Since it's too convenient, I put a lot of stuffs to Google Drive and the 15GB free space is easily full. Then, I started using those free cloud management solution such as http://jolidrive.com that is able to management many cloud storage within one management console so that I can literally get more free cloud storage space. That is cool, but not enough as it's not able to combine all the cloud as one. I need to decide which storage is for what type/category of data to store. For example, Google Drive is for storing photos, movies, and music, while Dropbox for working documents, etc. Then, I found http://free.cloudbacko.com that is able to combine many Google Drive / Dropbox accounts into one big space, which pretty satisfied my ever growing backup needs. Now, I've applied 6 Google Drive accounts primarily for using with Cloudbacko to get 6 x 15GB = 90GB free space. Good enough for my cloud backup purpose so far. Another cool feature is the files and filenames encryption before storing on the cloud. All my data storing on those 6 Google Drive accounts is now encrypted. When you browse your backup data through Google Drive web interface or installed software, they're encrytped into a bunch of meaningless info. So, people from Google will not be able to know what I've put into their cloud storage. It makes cloud storage a real good platform for online backup. I would say they will upset many online backup service providers, as this service is free. So, just like to share it here to let more people benefit from this cool service.

I love DropBox and have used it for years both personally and in a business environment. The biggest challenge that they face is they provide a service that is easily replicated by any number of companies, including powerful ones like Google , Amazon and Microsoft. The services are a dime a dozen right now and they way I see it, there are two things that can set a company apart: 1) tight integration with multiple platforms and 2) lots of storage space. Dropbox is doing a great job on the integration front. But right now, they are getting pressure on the storage space issue. So right now I am making the switch to a product by Barracuda called Copy. They start you out with 20GB of space (more than I have on DropBox after years) and with referrals of 5GB a pop it can go up quickly from there. Check it out at https://copy.com?r=BlX7tm.

Its a very well written article so far i have ever reaad but it really does not matter that what came first, What matter is what people are prefering now a days in this such modren working environment where data security has been taken very seriously.

People prefer cloud storage instead on online storage as per many data securoty officials.

There are many encryption software where you can save your data online or online cloud storage.

I have been using data protecto for online cloud storge and its giving me free 500mb space.

Datto utilizes Hybrid Cloud Technology to improve redundancy and allow users greater protection of their systems and data. Hybrid Cloud continuity is simple in concept yet robust in feature set; it leverages the advantages of local backup and the security of the cloud.

It starts with workstations and servers protecting data locally across the Local Area Network (LAN) to the Datto appliance from there it is automatically transmitted to the secure Datto cloud. This technology improves fault tolerance while reducing the reliance on bandwidth speed. The local Datto device can act as a restore hub for everything from files to application and system fail over, it can also act as a staging environment for offsite transfer. Scheduling off-site data transfers can be critical for bandwidth management and carries no risk of having unsaved backups. In addition, should the local device be compromised data that was transferred to the Cloud can act as a replica site for the business. A local only backup option cannot ensure data integrity should a site wide disaster occur.

There's no doubt Google has made headway into businesses: Just 28 percent discourage or ban use of its productivity ­products, and 69 percent cite Google Apps' good or excellent ­mobility. But progress could still stall: 59 percent of nonusers ­distrust the security of Google's cloud. Its data privacy is an open question, and 37 percent worry about integration.